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Can't quite remember the name of that Finnish Javelin thrower, was a huge man, could hit a barn door at 9 miles. Well little did I know that he worked on the spinal unit in Nottingham, well it must have been him.....

Arriving in the Lung functions department, lungs in a bag, I was introduced to the diminitive doctor, a specialist in lungology, very pretty and petite, certainly working in the right department because she took my breath away...Now Mr Greaves, very formal and stiff, what we want to do is to hook you up to this machine, put this 12 inch diamater drainpipe in your mouth, ride a bike, fill in a form and pedal. The pipe will record your breathing rates as they change as you pedal, I said nothing.........well it would have been difficult!! A bit like at the dentist where they stick 2 hands, a mirror, a cordless drill and a water suction pump in your mouth, try to get their head in their as well and then calmyly say, Hi Mr Greaves, how are you today, well I ask you....So there I am practicing for the tour de france, breathing through a small sewage pipe, when the Finn sneaks up and sticks this javelin sized needli into my lobe............ahhh the ear, I thought, I looked atthe doc imploringly try ing with my eyes to say, am I supposed to keep on pedalling or can I punch this geezer, inthe meantime, blood running freely from my ear where a kind and fastidious nurse was catching it in a bottle. The medical profession do seem to always try to get you at a disadvantage!!

Ear lobes bleed profusely, they are apparently the best place from which to take blood for the blood there is rich in oxygen. The purpose of all this was to see whether my system (Pulmonary I think) could cope with the pressures that the impending surgery would place upon me. Like all spondylitics with a fused rib cage, breathing is easily compromised, 12 hours worth of anaesthesia to come would make those pressures severe. Thankfully a week ,,,,,,ahhh memory is fickle......Jan Zilezny, or something like thta.....yws the Javelin man

Anyhow, as I was about to say, a week or so later I was told lung functions were good and got the ok to proceed to the next stage. I couldnt pass go, I certainly couldn't collect £200 yet, but the medical obstacles, that may impact on the agreement in principle to proceed with the surgery, were reduced by 1.

I was counselled at length by the spinal team, paralysis, loss of sexual ability (well no change there then..oops excuse me), what not to do after the surgery and so it went.

Telephone rang, Hi Alan, Jenny Sycamore here...........wow blimey is it..................nooo dont get your hopes up, I'm not booking you in yet. To explain, Jenny was the spinal ward manager, tough cookie, but we got on ok.

"Alan"

"Yes Sister Sycamore"

"Alan I am just looking at your records, I see you are a smoker"

[**BLEEP**] I thought, this is going to stop everything.

"Oh Well Sister, the lung function tests were ok"

"Oh is alright Alan, just wanted to say that you won't be smoking on or near my ward, will you Alan?"

Well what can one say when given a choice between not smoking at all, definitely not smoking, or absolutely not smoking atall atall?

"No Sister no well I have tried acupun......."

The phone clicked and she was gone. The message indelibly clear.

Onthe Monday following, I was in my workshop/office at the hotel with Arnie Arnold, well he was Mark Arnold but I thought Arnie a clever skit on his surname....! You don't agree? Well perhaps not, I was taking a cigarette from my packet, Arnie was as well, our 8 o clock dizzy making drag long overdue,

"Im fed up of smoking Mark",

"Me too Al".

"Im giving up when I have finished this packet" I said.

Me too Al he said, I had 3 inthe packet he had 17. It was by chance a busy day, so I got a cigrette in the lunch break and mid afternoon, this left 1, I smoked it in the car on the way home, halfway through it I recalled my silly morning claim not to smoke again. I never have. Mark still does!

I was next summoned for the big tests, the ones to map brainwaves the critical neurological stuff, had AS damaged me so much that my reponses, to signals from the brain were impaired, the prospect of this troubled me, I wasn't on the operating table yet, would I get there?

A multi coloured plastic wig, a garden hosepipe and alack of laxative would decide.....

Oh the tension...da da da dum... Good job I know the ending. I always read the last page or two of fiction before I start the book from the beginning so, luckily, I'm surviving the wait for the next installment.

I've been trying to imagine how that conversation must have gone, of you being counselled at length by the spinal team on the risks of surgery. That must have been a pretty sobering and serious discussion. I wonder, did they discuss with you the relative risks to your future health regarding your prognosis and what you'd probably face in terms of progression, without such surgical intervention? Sorry, a serious question I realise - just ignore it if you want.

I'm ignoring this question, it seems also, that you doubt I have enough brainwaves to make a map!!! Well let me tell you, they don't call me Al the Atlas for nothing you know.

Seriously no, not too much talk of longterm future, mainly immediate post op, but buzz off you are sneaking free bits of story...lol

As an aside, it is a serious point that you make. A decision to give me this surgery, which at the time was huge, and very very expensive was made based on my prevailing condition which was deemed to be serious. 15 years have gone by. It is a dread though of what I might have been now if I hadnt had the op. My AS fusion and deformity moved onward quickly, gravity adds an exponential element of degree of bend, in other words; the more bent, the quicker and more you bend! I may well not be alive today but for this surgery, or at least, not wanted to be alive.!

In the meantime there is a bubbling sensation, growing, worrying. Not in my body but at work. I worked for Queens Moat Houses, a large Hotel chain mainly in England but with Hotels in Europe too. Excellent Hotels, ours in particular was spectacularly well run and making pots of money. The newspapers, when it broke, ran the headline

"Second largest ever british business loss"

2.8 Billion in debt at, Queens Moat Houses. Redundancies inevitable!

I was summoned again to the hospital shortly after this, whilst there my head was wired with more than 50 cables, sandpaper used on the scalp to ensure secure glued fixings of each cables to my brainy nut. Wristlets were fixed together with straps around the ankles. Electrodes then at neck, shoulder, elbow, thigh and knee.

Laying on a bed, my makeshift wig stretching out above me (taking me well over 6 feet 5 for the first time in years) I was wheeled toward a computer where the 50, other ends, of the cables were slowly painstakingly connected to the input part of the machine. I wasn't worried, computers had taken men to the moon, surely now this one wouldn't fail and cause my hair to stand on end!!

All was set. On the bed, wires everywhere then one by one charges were sent to eah of the ankle and wristlets. It felt really odd. I found myself involuntarily giving the thumbs up sign with both hands, at the same time, simultaneously and together..!! There was nothing I could do to stop it. I did think that reastaurants might utilise this technology,

"Did you enjoy your meal sir?"

A waiters furtive grope and surreptitious poke beneath the desk, a quick press and an unwilling thumb, or two pop up affirming that the meal was super dupe whether in fact it was or not.

I digress, whilst all this was going on, a brainwave was visible on the monitor. This was kept and stored. Times were measured in terms of delay from brain instruction to move thumb to thumb actually moving. Later this information would become the most critical tool, other than the hammer and chisel, used in the surgery.

Queens Moat board of directors were all removed bar one. New team selected by goverment officials were placed in charge. BA the only former director remaining was awarded the unenviable task of sacking many Hotel General Managers. Cruelly, whence he had completed this grim deed, he too was removed. A dirty trick.

We were untouched. Michael, (the big boss and my friend, a man moving in a diferent social world to me, my boss, a tough guy, seemed to like me, we always got on well and became good friends. There is much to tell of Michael and the cruelty of fate, I have an empty space in my heart, but that is likely yet another tale for another day) explained at a meeting that he had had enough and would be moving on, he felt that others of us would be at risk too, he managed to secure a good voluntary redundancy package for me.

I left the hotel, New Years Day, 1994.

In the meantime Jenny Sycamore had been busy and had let me know that all tests were now done, counselling complete, and everything was a go. Wow.

Did I want to proceed? she asked. Of course I did. Odd for me to be so determined on a course, but in this case, the moment J K Webb said they would do it, I never waivered (well nearly never, there was that one moment!) from the pathway to surgery.

I said a sad goodbye to Michael and others at the Royal. I had enjoyed great times there, the job had put me well on to enjoying life without drink, put money in my pocket and stimulated my intellectual desires, I had loved the Royal, so left with a heavy heart, but knew that when Michael left the following month, that it would never be the same again.

I used the redundancy money to build a small workshop a the side of my house, I had a plan.

Jenny rang me in March, the date had been set....May 4th....

How odd is the formulation, the timing of life's chapters, a happy time at the Royal ending, a huge door opening toward what could be wonderful or terrible......i had a cup of tea.........the hosepipe next......

It wasn't that I didn't think you had enough brainwaves lol... but rather that I was envisioning this massively complex printout, lines bursting in colour and moving wildly across the page, every which way at once! A sort of kaleidoscope composition to match your character and uniqueness! You could've had it framed and sold it for billions as a one-of-a-kind work of art. You could've crafted a nice wooden frame too in your spiffy new workshop! Yes, it's too bad you didn't ask if you could save it. lol